A&M takes Carhartt College Series, Bensema shooting for Classic

Josh Bensema, Seven Coves Bass Club member & representing A&M, is in the shootout for top national honors in the Carhartt College Championship.
2015 College Classic Bracket


He and his partner, Matt McArdle, used two fish for 3 pounds, 10 ounces to claim the Carhartt Bassmaster College Series National Championship as a team.


Texas A&M teams pushes through to title


Congrats to the A&M team and to Josh for powering through til this point. I hope to hear he takes the individual title and grabs a birth in the coming 2016 Bassmaster Classic

Proud to say I was an Aggie Angler during my days at A&M. I wish our University would step up and provide some financial support for the guys on the fishing team. A lot of these guys spend their own money to have a chance to compete and represent the University. A few schools offer scholarships to the kids on their fishing teams. I'll be watching as much and as often as possible tomorrow to see if he earns the berth. All of the kids that have won the bracket have ended up going Pro and most have been successful (Jordan Lee, Andrew Upshaw, Matt Lee??, Pruett seems to be doing well in the Opens), so maybe we'll see Bensema do the same...

Anybody see what they won? Money? A boat? I can't find that anywhere. I get bragging rights and maybe a shot at the classic but these guys need to at least be thrown some lunch money lol

When I fished it the winners didn't get much. Maybe $1500 or something. It was bragging rights and a chance at a classic berth that everyone was shooting for.

wow, that sucks... Nationals at FLW was 50k, a boat and a shot at the Forrest wood cup...

the fact we have 3 different national champ trails is weird too... but oh well

Plenty of good Ags around to put something together for these boys. Count me in if someone wants to spearhead this and gets some cash together to help these guys out. We could also begin to petition the school to sponsor them. At this day and age you can't deny the growing young sport of competitive bass fishing. The high schools are embracing it and so should the universities.

Jackson

I think it would be a great thing to get together an expense fund for these anglers. Let's see what would be involved & move ahead on it
I'll talk with Josh & see what he might know about any restrictions regarding funding...

I'm betting there is some NCAA Collegiate rule that will screw up trying to help these guys out! May have to do it discretely through a family member!

College fishing isn't an NCAA sport. But the problem is working around/with A&M. I was the president of the Aggie Anglers for a year while I was still in school, and doing anything financially with the university is a pain in the azz. Especially when it came to winnings. The college tournaments made the checks out to the university, so we had to turn the check into A&M, then apply for the money we won. And after a few months, sometimes longer, we would get a portion of the money back. A&M took a chunk out as royalties even though they didn't provide boats, insurance, tackle, scholarships or anything. It was so we could wear A&M on our jerseys. Which is an entire different story. A&M had to be the only logo on that side of the jersey. So our sponsors were never displayed at the same time as ATM...

The A&M Fishing team is a student run club. There are no rules governing gifts/assistance/donations from outside the University, so donations can certainly help. Texas A&M provides exactly $0 to the club. All boats, tackle, expenses are paid for by the members. They do have a treasurer and a club account that use to be funded by member dues, fundraisers, and any tournament winnings. That is what we used for stuff like weigh in equipment, helping send competitors to championships, and club events like a fish fry before a tournament or something.

I would really like to see an Aggie tournament and have Aggies all over the state get together for a weekend of fishing and networking. I think it would have a great turnout and be pretty awesome.

I'm going to be on board for this. I wonder if The Association could manage a restricted fund (meaning donations are directed to the club only) and then release the funds on specified dates?

All of that is absolutely true. We hosted a charity tournament 3 years ago Conroe and had about 25 boats show up. We had a great time hosting it and raised a good amount of money for a charity. This year the Aggie Anglers hosted another charity, again on Conroe and had about the same turnout. I am sure they will host another one in the spring.

I'm a Baylor grad so I don't really worry about how or where the Aggie club gets their money. My question is who decided to have a championship where 2 fish for 3 pounds 10 ounces wins the whole thing. What a snoozer...

The winner gets to fish the 2016 Classic, plus paid entry to all opens next year. They receive 7500 for expenses and use of a wrapped Toyota Tundra and boat. Bensema finished 2nd, Trevor Ho won he had a limit for 6 something. Thought the bracket was a cool deal, but not the 3 fish limit or where they fished.

Can you let me know what he says? We are getting some troops rallied over here to try and get some support for these guys.

Jackson Bean
903-456-5554

BASS did. They have a knack for picking "awesome" places for the college tournaments. While I was still in school they sent us to the Ouachita River in Monroe LA. Worst tournament I almost fished. The river was out of it banks and there were massive floaters coming down the river in all the current. I say almost fished because my lower unit came apart in practice, didn't hit any floaters or anything, so I got to pack it up and drive home. Weights were pathetic. I wasn't the only college angler to tear something up that weekend...

I'm all for fishing places that are safe, i.e. don't have floaters coming down a river. But I don't understand why people don't like tough tournaments. I like the challenge.

I think you are missing the boat. Make the check out to the Aggie Bass Club (Student Organization) and send to the treasure of the club. Nuf Said... Money is deposited into their student account and they have to vote on how to spend the money... Easy as pie... But if you want a tax donation letter, then you will have to send to Texas A&M and the club will be out of the loop and how to spend the money... Come on guys... Support the club and forget the tax write off...

What are you talking about? Alex, along with the rest of us former students, are trying to explore avenues to get some support to the guys on their own dime. I think you are missing the boat. If I'm giving $100, I'll give it straight to Aggie Anglers. If I giving a grand or two, you better believe I'm exploring ways to keep our government from taking a chunk. "Nuf Said..."

Please keep the ideas coming.... We already have some goodies being put together for the lads.

Fighting Texas Aggie Class of 1996

Thanks for the advice. I'm not missing anything. I spent 5 years in college fishing clubs. I have a pretty good idea of how things work. Most clubs have a tax id number, so you can donate to them directly, IF you are concerned with a tax write-off. I don't have enough deducts for charitable donations to make any difference when it comes time to pay the Uncle. Not that my tax business or how I spend my money is anyone's concern.

The point of my initial post, you know this one:



Was to highlight that THE UNIVERSITY they represent does nothing to help them,

I talked with Josh today at the SCBC meeting. It looks like y'all are right about the funding. The university didn't pitch in but a little towards the A&M logo on the jerseys, if I understand correctly. I'll be talking more extensively with Josh after he makes some inquiries on this subject.

Making checks directly payable to the club should keep the money where the anglers can use it. Their account was dented pretty good this go around and the anglers came out of pocket quite a bit as well.

Policy changes at A&M would be slow at best, non-existent at worst. As long as they have NCAA teams, that's where the focus (and $$) will be. Though, maybe if enough noise were made, they could at least provide a celebration ceremony for the Aggie Anglers when they bring the trophy home

I'll keep posting as I get info.

Thanks
Karl

Sorry about not responding quicker, I've been out of state for the past few days. I'll try to answer a few of the questions here.
We are in no way financially supported by the university. We pay our own way for all the tournaments, big or small. This year we have started trying to raise funds by talking to some Aggie business owners. We are making headway, but it is a slow process. Hopefully we will have more luck since Josh and Matt represented the university so well at nationals.
We can accept donations to the club. Checks just have to be made out to Aggie Anglers. We have a university bank account that everything goes through and we manage.

Thank ya'll for bringing more attention to this. That alone helps us out with getting recognition. Feel free to pm me with any more questions.

Brennan it would be cool if there was a spring and fall fundraiser tournament, or maybe do something like Lamar (I think it was them) did and maybe have a small fundraising tournament trail. I would definitely bring the boat down for it.

Thanks for the input Brennan! On our end, we'll do what we can for y'all. There's some reach to manufacturers & media outlets we can work to the best of our ability. We work many websites and we'll see if we can push some hits through them as well as social media.

Keep up the good work & we'll do what we can...

Karl